A Single Survivor
by Angel1876
Summary: After Heiter was forced to watch his pet die once again, he opens his eyes to find himself in the pool room. Somehow, he'd managed to live. And there was another person, who'd also survived, though perhaps not for long. Lindsay/Heiter, oneshot. Happens between The Beginning, and Infection.


Heiter's head throbbed painfully. For what felt like hours, that ne sensation was the only thing he was aware of. Slowly, distantly, other things began to fill his consciousness. First, it was the burning in his neck, and also in his leg. Then, he realized that he felt cold. He was laying against something hard, something that was smooth against his back.

The doctor tried to open his eyes, but immediately shut them again when the blinding white of the room pierced them harshly. A low moan bubbled from his throat as he reached his hand up to press against his aching head. His fingers made contact with a wet warmness, a sensation that he recognized as blood. What was happening? And why was he in the pool room?

Bracing himself, he opened his eyes again, and was greeted with the sight of the dead officer, floating in the pool. Memories flooded back, flashing through his mind at an almost dizzying pace. The police men, the warrant, his centipede...attacking him. That last one...he shook it off. Before he passed out, he remembered the gun, pointed right at him. Then nothingness. Apparently, the bullet had only grazed him, thus giving him the head wound.

He took a moment to marble at this, that he was still alive. But he had work to do, hadn't he? It was going to take him quite a bit of work to fix this, particularly now that these men were dead. They left to obtain a warrant, an would never return. This did not look good for him. He'd had a plan before, how to make their disappearance appear an accident, but that was going to be so much more difficult now that his house was basically soaked with evidence that they'd been killed there.

Stubbornly ignoring the dizziness he felt, the man pulled himself to his feet and limped down to the basement where his tools were. There, he set to cleaning and bandaging his wounds. Once that was done, he went back up the stares, and went to the room where his centipede had been last he saw it.

As he'd expected, the creature was indeed a sorry sight to behold. The head had bled out from the self inflected trauma, and the end...he approached and knelt next to her, reaching a hand out to stroke her hair. He could feel how cold she was, and sighed. This must have been an agonizing fate to suffer. If they'd just left him be, she wouldn't have had to gone through that. Foolish thing, his centipede had been. It would have rather come apart than continue in it's new existence. It didn't appreciate what he had done for it...

A low sound drew his attention toward the middle. The girl, Lindsay, whimpered distantly. Her eyes were halfway open, and she weakly strained against the two corpses that trapped her. She was dying. Her body couldn't take the dead flesh it was connected to.

He frowned, and stood, going back into his basement. He went through his medications, intending to find something to put her down with. He found one, and held the vial in his hand, gazing at the clear liquid. One shot of this would kill her. He could start over again, get another group of humans, but...

But he couldn't risk drawing more attention to himself. He wasn't sure if he could avoid jail even then. It might already be too late...but more than that, more than the thought of his own safety. He'd lost his dogs, he'd lost his centipede. He couldn't do this again.

Hurt flooded through him, and he found himself lowering the glass to the table. Instead, he found another vial, one that contained a softer medication. This one would simply put her to sleep. The two drugs in front of him, he stared off into the distance. He could save her, so he thought. But why bother? She was going to be just another human if he did.

She was the last living part of his beloved pet.

She would make it so much harder to hide this from the authorities.

If she died, he'd literally have nothing left.

She would probably die anyway, after the trauma she'd suffered.

Would he feel worse if he didn't even try?

Heiter shook his head, angry with himself. Why was he even thinking about this? The answer was more than obvious. Kill her, it would be easier on them both. He picked up the lethal medication, the one that would spell her end, and a syringe. He started to slip the needle through the top, but stopped. He was struck with the image of injecting this into the girl, of watching the life leave her, of hearing her final breath. She'd fought him, just like Schreck had. She was put in the middle, and would be the last of the three to fade, just like Schreck. And she would die, his hands running over her back comfortingly, just like...

He sighed again, his headache worsening. After a moment of teetering on the edge of indecision, he switched vials, filling the syringe with the other medication. It was not going to be pleasant for him, but...if he could, he would save her. She would not die as Schreck had.

He returned to Lindsay's side, and knelt down. Her body tensed, her glazed eyes meeting his fearfully. She writhed, trying to get away from him, but it was in vain. There was simply no where for her to go, no escape from him. She half screamed as the needle slid into her, obviously thinking that he was indeed euthanizing her as he'd originally planned. Soon, her struggles stopped, her breathing slowed.

Now that she was unable to fight him, he grabbed a scalpel and set to cutting away tissue from the man in front of her, and the woman behind her. He obviously could not drag the three of them down stares, so this was necessary. Once she was free, he carried her down to the basement and set to removing all the foreign flesh from her body. He sewed her cheeks closed, and her buttocks, listening to the steady beep of the machine he'd hooked up to her chest. When he'd finished, he bandaged her up, and left. If she was to die despite his efforts, she would be doing it alone. He'd already waisted far too much time caring for her, and hardly any time attempting to remain a free man.

He put on his surgical gloves, and hauled the police men into the car. He drove their car off the trail and into the woods, used a brick on the gas pedal to make the car drive into a tree. He took the bodies out and cut them open, in the hopes that the wild animals would smell them and destroy the evidence of exactly how they'd died. He'd removed the bullets, of course, and hosed the one down to remove at least some of the pool water. It wasn't the best plan, but it was currently his only one.

When he got back to the house, he set to chemically cleaning every blood stains. They were sure to investigate him further, and he didn't want them to find anything. He went through the pool room several times, drained the book and cleaned it too. He was at this exhausting task for hours, the fact that he'd already been drained didn't help in the slightest. At the very least, he didn't have to worry about the mens' fingerprints and the like in the living room, as he was going to have to claim that they came, left to get the warrant, and never came back.

He took the other two bodies and put them in his own car, driving them in the opposite direction and leaving them in the forest as well. He would have preferred to burry them properly, but this was not possible at the moment.

One the Asians' blood had been cleaned up as well, Heiter went back into the basement to check on Lindsay.

He was surprised to find her actually alive, her heart beating strong and normal in her chest. The only survivor out of both creatures he'd made. Heiter breathed an unexpected sigh of relief and got up onto one of the hospital beds near her, taking the chance to finally, finally rest. The sun had set and was ready to raise once more, that was how long he'd been working with his injuries.

He was amazed, in retrospect, that no one had appeared during his cleanup. Had they not noticed the absence of their officers? Were they busy that day? He wasn't going to question it too deeply at the moment, he would deal with it when they showed up.

When they did, he would have to find a place to hide the little human girl so she wouldn't give him away. He sighed, not able to think about it in his current state. With the soft beep of her heart echoing in his ears, Heiter fell into a deep, much needed sleep.n his current state. With the soft beep of her heart echoing in his ears, Heiter fell into a deep, much needed sleep.


End file.
